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Weimar University

Don Mackintosh

The Blessed Hope

Today our theme is the Second Coming and last night the church and study read the whole Bible.

So we divided the Bible up for those of you who were not here and so we read the entire Bible asking what did the Bible say about the second coming or the need for the second coming or what impacted us most about the verses we read.

And so that was what we did last night and now we're kind of building on that in our message for today on the Second Coming.

Let's just have an added word of prayer here before we look at this.

Father in heaven, Lord, we're thankful for the opportunity we have to study your word.

We know there are many parts of the world where there is not freedom to do that, so we are thankful today that we have the freedom here.

And bless us and give your Holy Spirit to help us understand your Spirit-inspired words.

So Christ's second coming, we're in a series here of the truths that were revealed from God to John, sent by an angel, the revelation of Jesus Christ.

And these revelation of Jesus Christ, these special truths that are pictured in Revelation chapter 1, the scriptures, salvation, the second coming, the Sabbath, the sanctuary, the state of the dead, spirit of prophecy, and the saints, all were revealed way back 80, 90, 80, 100.

And then of course Christ embodied each of those in his own life.

So these are the teachings of the faith and actually the faith of Jesus, the beliefs of Jesus.

And so we're looking now at Christ's second coming, That is the Second Coming, the third 1 in our series that we've been in.

What happened to Jesus, or what happened the first time that Jesus came?

Perhaps thinking about that would make us more interested in the second coming of Jesus.

The first time he came, in our last message we look at the first advent, we get the word adventist from that word advent which means appearing, and in his first appearing when he came as a baby and he grew up, he brought healing.

Because the word salvation means, actually in Greek, healing or restoration.

And as he ministered, as he grew up faithfully in his first 30 years in Nazareth, a town of only 500 people, he was faithful And it became known that he had an upstanding character.

Some people say to me, I'm not sure I need to be baptized or re-baptized.

Well, when Jesus got baptized the first time, you know what happened in his life?

He went about doing good and healing all manner of sickness and disease among the people.

And this happened within this, what was called the evangelical triangle there.

There were many, many, many miracles that he did, but the 37 that are recorded in the New Testament happened in that section of Bethsaida and Chorazin and up there near Dan, that northern part of Galilee.

And so Jesus turned the water into wine, he healed the official's son, he cast out evil spirits, he healed fevers and sick, even helped people catch fish, he cleansed people with leprosy, he healed paralyzed people, and he healed withered hands, he raised people from the dead, he calmed storms, He cast legions of demons into a pig herd, thereby killing 2 birds with 1 stone or 2 pigs with 1 stone.

First of all, killing the things that you shouldn't eat and the things that are unclean as a miracle at the same time.

And he healed Withered Band's hand on the Sabbath.

He did actually 7 miracles on the Sabbath, but sometime maybe I'll cover those when we cover the Sabbath in this series.

All of these different things, In fact, all the books in the world were told by the Apostle John couldn't contain all of what Jesus did.

There are 37 examples, but perhaps that is why, Perhaps that's why people might be interested in seeing Jesus come again.

I mean, if you had heard of a healing, someone being raised from the dead on this campus, how many think, we might have a few more people in church today.

First time Jesus came, it was so amazing that they said, man, we would like him to come back.

First Corinthians chapter 15, I delivered to you first of all that which I also received, says the Apostle Paul, that Jesus Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures 350 prophecies pointing towards Jesus and that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures and that he was seen by Cephas and by the 12 and after that he was seen by over 500 brethren at once, all of whom, the greater part, remain at the present, but some have fallen asleep." In other words, they died.

After that, he was seen by James, then all the apostles, then last of all, he was seen by me, Paul says, as 1 born out of time.

So the idea is that Jesus came, and the ultimate miracle was that he died, but that he rose again.

And This is a major teaching in the New Testament.

This is what happened during the First Advent.

And based on historical evidence alone, 1, 400 scholars, even critical unbelievers, admit that Jesus died by crucifixion.

His death caused the disciples to despair and lose hope.

The disciples had experienced what they believed as literal appearances of the risen Savior throughout the book of Acts, which is full of them.

The disciples were transformed from doubters to bold proclaimers as a result.

In fact, the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, which was written by Luke, were scrutinized by a scholar who said, this could not have happened.

But after he looked for 25 years, he said, these things are verifiable historically.

And he moved from being an atheist to being a believer.

The resurrection was the central message they preached in Jerusalem.

That would have been easily dismissed if it was not true.

When the Christian church was born and grew, James and Paul, both skeptics, were converted.

No tomb is venerated, although several sites have pointed to as possible places where Jesus was entombed and then resurrected.

It's no wonder that based on the first Advent that there are those that are interested in a second Advent.

How many of you are interested in the second coming?

The Bible says many times that Jesus is coming again.

Now when he had spoken these things, while they watched he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.

And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven, as he went up, behold, 2 men stood by them in white apparel, who also said, men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven?

This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven will so come in like manner as you saw him go into heaven.

He left on a cloud, he'll come back on a cloud.

And that is what Titus just called the blessed hope.

And the hope is based on what happened in the first coming.

All of the apostles, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, that dedicate massive amounts of ink, Matthew 24, signs of his coming, Mark 13, signs of his coming, Luke 21, signs of His coming.

John, forget it, I'm writing a whole book about it, he said.

And that's the whole idea in our text from Revelation chapter 1, verse 7.

Behold, he is coming with clouds, and every eye will see him, even they who pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of him, even so, amen.

Number 1, 1 group will say they'll mourn and they'll cry for the rocks to fall on them, it says.

These are the rulers of the world, the generals, those who are large and in charge.

And they think they can handle everything.

I'm not sure the Democrats would like to see Jesus come.

I'm not sure the Republicans would like to see Jesus come because they like power.

And I'm not sure you wanna see him come because you might wanna be in charge.

But if you're older, If your hips are not working like they used to, if your mind is not working like it used to, if you've got some aches and some breaks, and there's no pep in your step, no spunk in your trunk, your eyes are not popping, your jaw's not dropping, your nose is not flaring, and you're not staring, then you might be saying, I need help!

And maybe I would like to see Jesus come again.

So that's 1 group that says, I don't want them to see him come, but other groups says, he is coming.

I love to read that text to people on their deathbed.

Next thing you're gonna see is Jesus coming again.

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The Blessed Hope

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